Dove: Choral Music

"The quality of any cathedral choir is governed by the standard of its trebles...Wells is currently enjoying a superb top line, rewardingly displayed in this collection of Jonathan Dove's radiant choral works, including a first recording of his sparkling Missa Brevis...It makes an attractive, stimulating addition to the liturgy." The Observer, 5th September 2010

"there's so much freshness, attack and palpable involvement...not least from the consistently excellent boy and girl choristers. Dove's music is splendidly effective and birghtly expressive." BBC Music Magazine, November 2010 ****

"The choir sings as one with crisp diction and expertly handled dynamic contrasts, whilst Vaughan's multi-faceted organ performance is genuinely exciting to listen to, whether haunting and subdued or triumphantly raising the roof. Close your eyes and you could be in Wells Cathedral." Classic FM Magazine, November 2010 ****

"This first rate disc can only enhance further the reputations of Wells Cathedral Choir and of Jonathan Dove."
(MusicWeb Oct 2010)

Jonathan Dove (b1959) is a hugely versatile composer who is perhaps best known for his remarkable canon of operas which range from the hugely successful comic opera Flight, based on a group of people trapped together in an airport for twenty-four hours, to works written especially for television, community operas and a series of works scored for period instruments. In an interview for Time Out in November 2009 he said: 'I remember in my early teens reading The Hobbit and playing along with it on the piano, translating it into music … Around that time I also built model theatres of increasing sophistication-the last one used up all of my Meccano set and had ultraviolet lights and a hydraulic revolving stage.' It is hardly surprising, then, if this instinct for the dramatic also informs his church music at every turn. He has written a great deal of choral music and the works selected for this recording show the range and versatility of his imagination and his response to varied texts.